Growing from Boyhood, to Biblical Manhood
In this Father's Day message, we look at Paul, and his process of moving from boyhood to biblical manhood.
Click here for the recording of this 6/15/25 Service, and you can fast-forward to 27:28 to get to the start of the sermon.
Our text comes from 1st Corinthians 13.11
11When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.
Introduction…
I have labored over this sermon, so as not to be misunderstood; the title of this sermon was intentional, as they all are (Let’s repeat it again, together)
How are we doing at that task today in America?
How does this verse address the process?
How did I raise 3 boys to be men? It took a while, and we both made some mistakes along the way, but we got there.
WSJ- “A Church’s Campaign to Teach Lost Boys How to Be Men”
Life Tabernacle, Baton Rouge is teaching adolescent boys in - Vocational skills; To be men of faith; Biblical manhood; how to shave; starting a savings account; property maintenance; deriving satisfaction from his work, and his woman
Young men are failing in school, work, life purpose, and launching into adulthood
The church can serve in the absence of a father, teaching biblical gender roles; churches have 2000 yrs’ experience in teaching this
For the first time in history, men 18-29 are more religiously affiliated than women
They want to know how to have a meaningful life; how to get through the day
This church has a pond, 4 BB diamonds, a workshop, a café that teaches job skills
The pastor preaches in a suit and tie modeling business dress
Young men are falling behind their female peers; going from boys to bums
There is a crisis of biblical masculinity- thus, this church is targeting teen boys
“We are losing the strength and the power of the man in the household”
They send 50 buses to the projects to pick people up for church, many of which are young boys
churches like Life Tabernacle are getting more effective at appealing to disaffected young men. They’re offering “a vision of society that restores their lost status, where men are occupying their ‘rightful’ role as leaders in society, business and family,”
This kind of masculinity is not toxic, but biblical
An emphasis on biblical manhood is NOT a de-emphasis on the biblical role of womanhood- I believe in strong women, and I am a participant in 5 generations of strong Johnson women
The goal of all this- boys to find Christ; stay in the church; go to college or trade training; biblical marriage; in short, learning their place in the world
Our text…
Paul is writing, and puts this in the middle of the love chapter; he is writing in 1st person, which he often did; he referenced himself in his writing and preaching, again, often; imagine that…
When I was a child, nepios, used 5x in the verse alone; childlike, childish, infantile, with a negative implication of immaturity or positive implication of innocence, depending on the context (stepbible)
He focuses on 3 aspects of acting like a child
Speaking, laleō- to talk; to make vocal utterance; to babble, to talk; in NT absolute to exercise the faculty of speech (stepbible)
Thinking, froneō- to regard, hold an opinion; to set one’s mind on; to have a (certain) attitude (stepbible)
Reasoning- logizomai- to credit, count, reckon; regard, think, consider, calculate; enumerate; (stepbible) reasoning- to think then work toward a best conclusion, having considered all the evidence at hand (slj)
All 3 of these must mature toward a biblically adult level
“When I became a man…”
“When I became a man,” anēr- male, husband; usually an adult male, but in some contexts the emphasis is on maturity rather than gender
“I did away with,” katargeō- to nullify, abolish, make ineffective; cease, pass away, end; to render useless, or unproductive, or unprofitable, to render powerless, to make empty and unmeaning, to render null, to abrogate, cancel, to bring to an end, to destroy, annihilate, to free from (stepbible.com)
There comes a time when the child must do away with the childish in order to become a man- this is a process
2 Reasons why young men don’t put away childish things (aka, failure to launch)
Fathers who won’t father biblically- absent fathers who spend too much attention on a job, hobby or other things to the neglect of their son; aka, men who refuse to lead their home biblically
Mothers who overcompensate for the above by a- babying adolescent boys who are no longer babies, or b- being too aggressive in home leadership because the man is dominated by the woman; he’s whipped
8 points on How to raise boys to biblical manhood
It starts with a biblical father; if not that, then a good surrogate who will assume that role
A biblical philosophy of childrearing- to learn this, read your bible
Have the courage to deal with your own childhood issues as you parent your own children
Biblical child raising involves love, and appropriate discipline (which is a form of love)
Expect them to grow to maturation, and hold them to that- have the maturity in yourself to expect maturity in/from them
Do not rescue them from the pain they have created for themselves- this is a form of abuse
Celebrate their maturity in speech, thought and reasoning
prayerfully, they will pass on biblical parenting to their own children, because modeling is the strongest form of teaching
Ps- why put this in the middle of the love chapter, 1 Cor 13? Because a man cannot really love his family biblically until he becomes a biblical man; when he does, everything changes for the better, often for multiple generations- ex, the legacy of Rev. Earl Barnabas Johnson
